The gaggle of women made their way past the crowd to an empty spot at the bar. No easy feat seeing how they were encumbered by purses, presents, coats and umbrellas. They loaded their loot onto the bar and leaned in to order drinks. The ring leader marshalled her friends and then turned to me to order.

“Two glasses of sparkling rose, a cosmopolitan, a pear margarita, two negronis and a buttery oaky chardonnay.”

It is always appreciated by bartenders everywhere when someone takes the lead on large parties. The bane of every bar is the person who orders one drink at a time for a party of 12, especially when six of those drinks were exactly the same and could have been made all at once.

Just as I was assembling the glassware and garnishes necessary, someone else leaned in.

“Are you busy?”

“Give me as second.”

“I just wanted to know if you were busy.”

“Once second ma’am.”

“I’m just trying to be polite.”

“OK.”

“I don’t want to interrupt you.”

“OK,” I said now trying to remember if I had put the vermouth in the negronis, or just the Campari.

“I’ll just wait then.”

“OK.”

“So, when you are finished.”

“OK.”

“What is that you are making now?”

Great. Now I couldn’t remember if it was two negronis or two cosmopolitans. In the bar business, for every customer who knows what he’s doing there are those who don’t. The problem is that those who don’t don’t know that they don’t.

There is an old saying, “Crazy people don’t think they are crazy. They think that they are right,” and after three decades in the bar business I wholeheartedly agree.

When I finally returned to my original group I walked right into a conversation midway through.

“I don’t know why our table isn’t ready,” one of the women said.

“Well, I think it’s because it is the holidays and they are super busy,” that holiday hostess with the mostest replied.

“I don’t understand,” her friend said.

The hostess tilted her head in that way that conveys the thought, “What do you mean you don’t understand?”

“Reservations are not guarantees,” she said. “They are best guesses.”

“Can’t they just ask the people to leave?”

“They won’t do that,” said the hostess. “Besides,” added the hostess. “We wouldn’t want them to do that anyway.”

“Why not?”

“Because if they can ask them to leave, then they would also be able to ask us to leave. too.”

“What do you mean?”

There was that head tilt again.

“I wouldn’t want someone telling us to leave, would you?”

“I don’t understand.”

“If it is OK to ask them to leave, then it would be OK for them to ask us to leave too,” she said, exasperation creeping into her voice.

“But what if we aren’t done?”

“Exactly,” said the hostess draining in one gulp the sparkling rose that up to that point she had only been sipping.

“I’m going to go ask them if they can speed those people up,” her friend said.

Something strange happens in busy places during the holidays. Even the simplest of simple tasks can be beyond the reasoning of seemingly reasonable adults.

Things like running a tab, standing in line, waiting your turn, paying for your drink. It is truly amazing.

“I thought it was first come, first served?”

“It is.”

“Then why aren’t you waiting on me?”

“Because you weren’t here first, they were.”

It happens every day, everywhere, every holiday season.

The party hostess stood there looking after her retreating friend, and then looked at her empty wine glass and then looked at me.

“Would you like another?” I asked.

“I would.”

“This one’s on me.”

“Why is that?”

“Just because.”

She just smiled and nodded her thanks.

Leaving me with these thoughts:

• Screaming is never an option for the service person, no matter how much you feel like it.

• Self-awareness begins with a question. Not about others, but rather, about yourself.

• “One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane,” said Nikola Tesla.

• Unrelenting, self-assured self-confidence is not the hallmark of sanity, but the wellspring of insanity.

• “Do unto others” is not just another rule, it is the Golden Rule.

• Just a second means just a second.

Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars: The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender” and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Follow him at jeffburkhart.net and contact him at jeff@thebarflyonline.com.